Owondiki's prison/room was a wide circle, lit with white bulbs that shone over the gray walls. There were decorated steel shelves, built around the tree trunks of erkanara trees that dug from the ceiling into the ground. The trees kept the earth above from collapsing down on her. The bed was on one side of the room, with one edge, curved like a circle that fitted into the wall while the other side was straight, making the bed a semi-circle with colorful pillows and a blue blanket on the gray sheets.

She had a television on the wall and a bathroom all to herself. She hadn't expected windows, but the air-conditioner was keeping the place ventilated and cool.

At least, it wasn't Ibesan.

She spent the first night pacing the room, unable to sit for long, wondering when they were going to bust into the room and demand answers that she wasn't willing to give. These people were rebellious savages. There was no depth to which they wouldn't sink.

"Good morning," a woman said, as she brought in fresh clothes, picked up the remote on the desk, and turned the television on. She even dropped a tray of food for Owondiki that Owondiki eyed with suspicion. Lastly, she uncuffed Owondiki and then she left.

As she opened the tray of yam and stew, Owondiki's stomach growled. Who was she kidding? She was hungry and tired. Before she knew what was happening, she was cleaning off the plate with her tongue and drinking the whole bottle of water.

Seconds after she burped, Owondiki was fast asleep on her bed.

___

She spent every waking hour in front of the television.

She had an entire network dish to herself, but Owondiki was too anxious to watch anything but the Jiki Broadcasting Network (JBN). She left it running when she was in the bathroom when she was sleeping or just pacing the room in nerve-wracking frustration.

Usehjiki hadn't seen rain since the clans went into isolation and yet every other African country in the region was in peak rainy season. The farms in Osekoni that fed the country were drying out and people were complaining on the news. Riots broke out over the tiny patches of fertile land and markets had to close because people kept looting each other's goods.

So far, six major riots had broken out across the country and the number of casualties was rising between clan-supporting commoners and anti-clans rebels. Owondiki couldn't bear to watch the news coverage of it but the Prime Minister kept trying to assure everyone that everything would go back to normal as soon as the storm passed.

"What storm?" Owondiki had asked before she checked herself. It wasn't her place to question the Prime Minister. If the clans said everything would be all right, then all they had to do was wait.

Besides, the biggest issue was Jera Franklin who was causing more concern.

"...we have twelve reported dead and twenty injured from the raid at the CA facility in Izecha. Jera Franklin and her hoard of terrorists killed twelve of the very people she claims to be fighting for..."

Owondiki had frowned at that, because as Jera had said, killing commoners was not her way. But if the clans said it was so, then it had to be. Besides, they'd blindfolded Owondiki on the way out of the building. There was no way for her to be certain that Jera's people hadn't murdered innocent citizens on the way in.

"... we mourn the solemn passing of Director Kemeka Izeh who has been ill for months now. Sources say he slumped at one of the seclusion units and was rushed to a Jiki citizens hospital where he was pronounced dead on arrival ..."

"Heh?" Owondiki asked the television, as she remembered the director falling to death as Jera's bullet struck him.

Then she shook her head. There had to be a reason why they would change the story. Jera wanted chaos and telling everyone about the director's death would cause chaos. This was the clans' way of protecting everyone. Owondiki had to believe that.

___

Eleven days into her stay in Boboyile, Jera released the video of the director's death.

Even though she'd been there when it was taken, she couldn't help but watch in horror as the director's head snapped back and the blood splattered out behind him. Owondiki pulled the blanket around her shoulders, shivering from anxiety, rather than the cold.

The truth was out there. Someone... Jera had tested the theory that commoners had been spouting for months and it was true. The divinity of the clans was broken. None of that mattered to Owondiki, anyway. Divinity or not, the clans were their leaders, and they ought to stay loyal.

___

"...is fake news. What you're looking at is doctored footage created by the ex-convict, mass murderer, Jera Franklin, who wants to plunge the country into confusion. We cannot let her stand in the way of peace and tranquility..."

Owondiki closed her eyes and sat against a pillar, with her back to the television.

They have a reason for lying, she thought. They have a reason for lying. There must be a reason.

It just wasn't apparent to Owondiki yet. If she'd been at Clans Authority, then she would have been privy to what was going on.

This was how she was when the door to her room opened and Jera entered.

She looked different from the hungry, skinny human being Owondiki had seen two weeks ago. The cast and crutches were gone and so was her hair. She'd shaved it all off, exposing the small roundness that crowned her entire body. She strolled into the room, laid back as ever, clad in a blue jumpsuit and a pair of black sneakers.

"Finally come to torture me, Miss Franklin?"

"I don't believe in torture. That's Clans Authority's thing."

Owondiki switched off the television.

"I won't help you."

"If you think I'm crazy, then why bother hindering me?" Jera asked. "Give me what I want and let me embarrass myself before the entire country. Won't that be good for you?"

Jera was right. She was a propaganda machine. She never did anything without publicizing it, but then again, that was the whole point. She'd come to Boboyile to find the fountain that first gave the clans their "bond" with the earth. She believed in it so strongly that she'd risked prison just to get a hold of Owondiki. Of course, it was bullshit. The clans were sacred because this was their land. There was no sacrifice. There was no traceable time. There was no fountain.

They were just simply chosen. Loved. Revered.

Owondiki could give Jera what she wanted and let her shame herself trying to prove otherwise. But there was a nagging feeling in Owondiki. What if Jera was right? What if the clans lied? What if there was a part of their history that the clans had denied? For all Owondiki's research and study of the clans, what if she'd been the one who'd fallen prey to propaganda?

"I want you to trust me, so I'll be honest with you," Jera said.

"That's a first."

"How has it felt to watch the news and see them twist the truth?" she asked, leaning on her left as her hips swayed with it. "Hmm? I hope you can imagine how those lies have affected commoners who weren't in the inner circle."

"You say that as if you've never lied before."

"We avoid the truth all the time. The difference lies in our motives."

"You're lying for self-preservation. They're lying to protect Usehjiki."

"I lied to change this country."

Owondiki tilted her head with a sad smile.

"Your fellow citizens are killing each other over a lack of resources. Is that the change you want?"

"When things stabilize–"

"When things stabilize?" Owondiki asked, fully turning as she rewrapped her blanket around her shoulders. "This world isn't stable. Nowhere is. Do you think that everyone who has died wouldn't prefer to continue living the wretched lives that you have cost them? You sanctimonious, self-righteous fool. This is the height of hypocrisy, Miss Franklin."

Jera dropped a newspaper on Owondiki's lap. Owondiki read it without touching it.

SIX OFFICERS FACE FIRING SQUAD FOR THE ESCAPE OF JERA FRANKLIN.

"Another bump on your road to stability, I presume."

"My grandfather was pro-clans, did you know?"

"You're telling me this because...?"

"People think he published that book as an insult to the clans but in reality, he published it to warn them."

What are you getting at, Jera Franklin? Owondiki thought to herself.

"My grandfather left newspaper clippings behind in those files. Clippings that don't always have the full picture because, as we both know, news outlets lie or offer incomplete information."

Jera removed two pages from the folder in her hand. They both had the same headline and the same story. But while one of them was pristine and brand new with clean paper, the other one was old and wretched and brown. Jera placed them on the floor in front of Owondiki. They both had the headline, "OFFICER AIDES AND ABATES THE ESCAPE OF CONVICTED FELON."

It was a story that named Owondiki and the Clans Authority facility where Jera had been rescued from. It must have been the story that informed Jera and her people of when and where to attack.

"What is this?"

"The old, wretched newspaper is from my grandfather's thirty-five-year-old file. The other one is from a week ago."

Owondiki reached out to touch both of them, noting that they felt the same, except for age.

"Where did he get it from?"

"I don't know. He died when I was ten and I never got to ask, but I believe he went to the future."

"The future?" Owondiki asked, fighting back laughter. "There's now a time portal in Usehjiki? As well as a fountain beneath the surface of Boboyile? Miss Franklin, you're supposed to stop believing in fairytales when you reach adulthood."

"Clans Authority believed my grandfather could see the future. If not, why did you come looking for his files?"

"There are a million explanations as to why your grandfather had the information that he did."

"You should read the details on this one," Jera said, pushing the paper about the firing squad news, till it was directly in front of Owondiki again.

Frowning at Jera, Owondiki took the paper and began reading. They talked about the guards and their inability to stop Jera, mentioning that some of them were in cahoots with rebels. Somewhere down the story, all their names were mentioned and Owondiki was shocked to find her name was included among the guards who were killed.

"What?" she dropped the old newspaper and picked up the new one with the same title and truly, they were identical: word for word. She wiped her eyes and read it again. "I was... I was supposed to be... I died?"

"In my grandfather's file, you died. Yes," Jera said, putting another paper before her. "This will happen in two years." The headline read: OWONDIKI OWONDIKI, BACK TO LIFE. "The clans didn't waste time claiming you'd died. A bunch of lies they'd told. And maybe I would have left you to die, like the many other people who've died in these files. But your resurrection told me that they'd lied. Like they always do."

"This is why you took me. To save me because..." she frowned as she suddenly realized what was going on. "Because you need me."

"If I could, I would have saved everyone else."

"Yeah, but they're not useful to you. I am. You want me to tell you where the clan isolation units are."

"Yes," Jera nodded. "I need you to tell me where they ALL are."

There it was – the reason for this whole hoax of a conversation. She needed Owondiki to reveal the locations and so she'd gone ahead and fabricated this whole thing to make Owondiki indebted to her.

Fool me once, Owondiki thought to herself as a plan formed in her head.